Julia McCarthy: Praising Paul Ryan ignores his hypocrisy on work-family issues

Sheryl Sandberg, the chief operating officer at Facebook, is a pretty popular person. More than 1,766,700 people follow her profile, and the things she posts often get thousands of “likes” and equally as many “shares,” meaning she has the potential to influence discussions.

One of Sandberg’s recent posts from last week was about Wisconsin congressman and former vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan. The post, which included a photo of Ryan and his children, was about the Wisconsinite’s potential vie for speaker of the House, a position which Ryan is being pressured to fill by many within the Republican Party.

But the post wasn’t about any of the politics behind who will be filling the role; rather, it was about Ryan’s comments on filling the position of speaker of the House. Ryan said, “I cannot, and I will not give up my family time,” when discussing the possibility of being speaker. Sandberg, in her post, wrote, “We need work to work for parents – and having leaders who weigh responsibilities as fathers as much as their responsibilities to their jobs shows all of us what is possible. #‎LeanIn‬.”

Ryan’s statement is one that can be deemed unusual for a multitude of reasons, one of the most glaring being the fact that Paul Ryan does not support paid family leave for others. Throughout his time in office, Ryan has opposed numerous bills supporting paid family leave and paid sick or medical leave.

Thus, Sandberg’s post is surprising because it seems to promote Ryan’s hypocritical stance. By failing to properly include critical elements in the discussion, such as Ryan’s voting history in relation to the topic of paid family leave, Sandberg inadvertently plays a role in furthering a skewed perspective on the Lean In movement, which aims to promote conversations about the workplace and family dynamic.

When Sandberg writes that we as a society need to work for parents and leaders who have responsibilities to both their families and their jobs, she fails to mention that Paul Ryan as an elected official has not done any of this work himself. Many politicians have in fact advocated for working families, politicians such as Barbara Boxer, Rosa DeLauro and Kirsten Gillibrand, but Paul Ryan is not one of these people. Thus, Sandberg awarding the Lean In Award to Ryan does a disservice to individuals who have supported paid family leave and other policies to support working families for their entire careers, not just in moments that affect them personally, such as Ryan is doing now.

Ryan should not be lauded for his stance just because he’s breaking some sort of mold as a male politician and discussing family time, a discussion often relegated to female politicians. His discussion of the need for work-family balance does little to help those he represents. And that’s the biggest issue behind this whole discussion: Promotion of Ryan’s statement about his own family is not reflective of what he would do for the families of the constituents he represents; it would be very dangerous to confuse the two ideas.

It’s one thing for Ryan to discuss the importance of balancing work and family, but it’s another entirely for him to translate his words and beliefs into action and concrete policy. Unfortunately, the latter will probably never materialize, meaning Ryan’s statement about wanting to spend time with his family is essentially worthless to average working American families. Ryan will get what he wants because he is in a position of power and can make demands, but the people he represents, those who rely on him to make demands for them, will not reap the same benefits.

Some believe Sandberg is bringing the issue to light because, regardless of Ryan’s personal views and politics, paid family leave is an issue that needs to be discussed. U.S. News & World Report notes, “The U.S. stands alone in the developed world in not mandating any sort of paid family leave; globally, only Papua New Guinea joins America in requiring zero weeks of paid maternity leave,” illuminating how critical it is that we begin a discussion around this issue.

But having this discussion in a way that praises a politician who is advocating for himself and not the majority of Americans stagnates the debate.